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Friday, July 31, 2015

Inflating your academic or professional
credentials could get you the job you desire, but could also lead to your
downfall

Those who assume that organisations simply
archive resume cop ies without ascertaining its verac ity and no one ever gets
caught, could be in for a shock. For every Tom, Dick or Harry who gets away
with suppressing or dressing up CV details, there could be a Johnny who gets
apprehended.If CVs were to be nudged to reveal not-sosugary secrets, it'll be
no laughing matter for the candidate. They could lose their jobs for
misrepresentation or worse, land in jail for forgery. Therefore, it's best to
draft a CV that presents facts as they are.

Minefield of frauds

“We come across cases of candidates being sacked
due to false information provided by them. I know of one candidate who had lost
his job in 2010, but had withheld this information on his CV to show continuity
in service. Soon, his new employer found out and he was asked to go,“ says
Sunil Goel, Founder and Managing Director, Global Hunt, an HR consultancy firm.

This is not an isolated case. Candidates also
commit more far serious offences like forgery. “Quite often, just to get a
raise, candidates forge their last drawn salary figure.There are instances
where telephonic interviews are rigged, and candidates ask qualified personnel
to give interviews on their behalf,“ notes Moorthy K Uppaluri, CEO of HR
consulting major Randstad India. In the IT sector, he says has come across
candidates who seek to boost their project experiences by listing projects done
by their friends or peers. Similarly, dubious technical institutes giving away
fake job experience certificates to candidates from companies affiliated to
their institutes also exist. Other frauds include candidates providing false
qualification details and concealing the number of times they have switched
jobs. “This is to ensure they are not seen as unstable,“ says Uppaluri.

Be prepared for the dressing down

Your misadventures with your CVs can land you in
a soup, if not in jail. “Typically, companies immediately terminate contracts
of employees who are found to have lied about their qualifications, experience
etc,“ says Goel. Jail terms are reserved for more serious offences. “There have
been cases when companies have reported the matter to the authorities after
consulting their legal teams,“ adds Goel. Employers and HR consultants are
increasingly adopting technological tools to check frauds. For instance, they
may insist on video interviews to eliminate the chances of experts
impersonating candidates. They could also hire agencies to conduct background
and qualifications verification. “They approach people other than the
references mentioned by the candidates. After following these stringent
processes, candidates are then probed on the statements made in the CV to gauge
authenticity,“ adds Uppaluri. “Compared to the previous years, there are
multiple tracking sources available today for verifying and scrutinising CVs.“

Social media, for instance, has emerged as a
powerful tool for employers to validate the information provided by
candidates.Basic details like age, school and college attended and employers
can be easily verified by going through the candidates' profiles on Facebook
and LinkedIN. The Internet never forgets and concealed blemishes can be dug out
at will. Don't assume that companies won't carry out investigations once you
sign up as an employee. If you do not have the expertise or skills mentioned in
your CV , you are bound to be unequal to tasks assigned to you, exposing your
falsifications. “Job performance and behaviour can lead to a follow-up
investigation into an employee's past. In case of dishonesty, it is often
accountable for legal action and may lead to termination,“ adds Uppaluri.

Transparency is the best policy

How do you insulate yourself against such
criminal action, loss of job and face? By being transparent. There is simply no
other way of evading the repercussions of misrepresentation. “Even if you have
lost your job, you must say so. Rarely do companies treat it as a disqualifier
these days and you could still land the job,“ says Goel. Likewise, you are
better off letting go of jobs that insist on minimum qualifications or marks
instead of fudging the information and risking long-term damage to your future
prospects.

Sales
of the device are at an all-time high, but so are the levels of customer
frustration

Dear Smartphone Manufacturers,

WATER WOES Problems like ‘water or
sweat damage’ and broken screens have increased over the years

Congratulations! Most of you have
been having a really good time. Smartphone sales are off the charts, future
sales are looking even better, many of you have cracked the online selling
model so well that you don’t need a single retail store in the country to start
selling your phones here. The ‘flash sale’ model, while dishonest and unfair to
loyal customers, has been a great way of fuelling more demand. Signing on
‘brand ambassadors’ (who know nothing about your product specifically or
technology in general) has become a modern-day lesson in selling snake oil.
Most of you are laughing all the way to the bank.

The thing is, I’m not happy. More
accurately, I’m really pissed off ! I wrote an open letter to all of you right
here in this column, more than two years ago (in April 2013). I was frustrated
with the state of the smartphone business then, harsh in both my words and
thoughts, and did expect a backlash. What I got was the exact opposite. Every
time I met the bigwigs of the industry, I was assured that my letter made
sense, that you’d taken it seriously and that real work would be done to make a
smartphone truly smart! Things would change, I was told. The frustrations of
the customer would be addressed. What I wasn’t told was that two years would
pass and not much would really improve. Let’s do a quick analysis of what I
ranted about then and how things are now, shall we?

SILLY SLOTS

I wrote then... So let me get this
right. Every time I want to add a movie, pictures or songs directly to my
storage card or switch SIM cards when I’m abroad, I’ve got to pry open the back
cover, use my nails to pull the battery out (thus rebooting my phone in the
process) and then get to the slot? How about a slot right outside? Pick your
favorite spot outside and put the damn slots right there. What you did... Most
of you did listen, but not in the way I was hoping. You sealed the phone to
make it slimmer and cheaper to manufacture, plus locked the battery permanently
inside (biggest pain point on new smartphones) thus forcing you to put the
slots out. Some of you went even further and took away the microSD card slot
itself. Now I have to live with whatever measly internal storage your
benevolent self doles out to me? One step forward but nine steps back.

PUERILE PROOFING

I wrote then.... You’ve made a
device that you want me to carry with me all the time, fish it out of my pocket
100 times, use it 16 hours a day and also made it the world’s most delicate
piece of equipment? Have you heard of the term ‘oxymoron’? Can you standardise
it so that EACH phone is water proof, dust proof and shock proof as a bare
minimum standard of toughness. What you did... Nothing! You’ve made it worse. I
know lots of people who carry on using phones with broken screens because they
can’t afford to keep getting them replaced. More people have gone to a service
centre with a ‘water damaged’ phone (sweat can do it now) and been told that
it’s not covered under warranty than ever before. Sony is the only one taking
it seriously, but only for their top range. Samsung did get into the game with
the S5 but its current S6 is terrified of water. Other phones aren’t any
better. Tough phones are super expensive and look super ugly as a special
add-on feature. You guys really dropped the ball on this one (maybe I shouldn’t
even use the word drop as none of your products can withstand one).

BATTERED BATTERY

What I wrote then.... Stop adding
cores to your processors, megapixels to your camera and pixels to your screen
till you can’t add power to your battery. The bare minimum one needs is 48
hours of battery life IRRESPECTIVE of how I use my phone and whether I use 3G
or not! What you did.... Okay, let me admit. Some of you got this one right.
You saw an opportunity and made it into a money spinner. A new category called
long long battery life. But have you seen what these look like? Big, chunky and
very ugly. I didn’t ask for a new category, I asked for normal, nicelooking
phones to have better battery life. Some of you put in a new ‘ultra long
battery life’ feature. Awesome, except have you used it yourself ? Do you know
what it does to your phone? Dim black-and-white screen, no data connection,
stops most apps that I really need to use and basically takes my super
expensive smartphone and turns it into a ` 700 feature phone. Oh wait, even
those have colour screens and data connections and apps that work!

I’m not done! We still have to
discuss why my brand new phone looks chewed up in less than three months, why
the highly touted cameraphone features are still a total gimmick, why wireless
charging has become an even bigger joke, plus all the new awesome things you’ve
added in the last two years. This open letter is just getting started.

Randomly
surf the web, find a movie to watch, or just chill out for a bit.

These
days, it seems we’re more hectic than ever. So it’s nice to have a little
downtime, however short. These five free apps can keep you entertained while
you’re waiting for that next meeting to start.

Fumble
around with StumbleUpon (Android, iOS). Let the app know about some of your
interests, and it’ll serve up random stuff from around the web that might
interest you. You’ll get straightforward blog posts and articles, plus quotes,
photos, videos, and more. If you like something, give it a thumbs up; if not,
give it a thumbs down. You can follow your friends to see what they like, too.

Use
Flixster (Android, iOS) to sneak in a movie preview here and there.
The app serves up previews for current and upcoming movies, passing along
showtimes and letting you buy tickets at participating theaters. And if you
feel more at home wearing sweats on your couch while surrounded by several
domesticated animals, the app will let you manage your Netflix queue to plan
out a binge or three.

Try
Ask.fm (Android, iOS) for some fun Q and A. You kill time by answering random
questions posed by other users. Queries range from a simple "Where are
you?" which asks you to take a photo of your surroundings, to more pointed
questions about life, love, and work. You can hook up with all your social
media connections to see what they have to say, and ask your own questions
should you get tired of simply answering them.

Chances
are, you probably haven’t fully tapped into all your phone’s features. Drippler
(Android, iOS) provides Android- and Apple-specific
versions that run down notable features, recent updates, and provide how-to
articles that you can use to really get into the nitty-gritty of that handheld
computer that’s always in your pocket.

Who
says you have to actually do something when you’ve got five minutes to
kill? Try 5 Minute Relaxation (Android, iOS) instead. This app helps you chill out for
five minutes, with guided meditations that help you return to normal until your
next appointment starts. There’s an end-of-the-day mode as well, which can
guide you to sleep if you happen to be too restless.

Most companies are seeking growth outside their
core business, according to a new survey. But few have made revenue gains as a
result—or have the right capabilities to support it.

A clear majority of executives say their companies are pursuing growth
in categories outside their core business—and report a strong belief that doing
so has created company value. But a McKinsey Global Survey suggests that over
time, companies’ aspirations to grow through these activities have produced
only modest results and that few companies have the right practices in place to
support such growth.

These are the key findings from a survey on
how companies expand into product or service categories beyond their core
business. Nearly nine in ten respondents say that in the past five years, their
companies have either pursued at least one activity in a new category, have
considered it, or plan to do so in the next five years. Companies are most
likely to pursue new activities through investments in organic growth and with
long-term interests in mind. Executives at emerging-economy companies report
greater paybacks than their peers at developed-economy firms—but few
respondents overall say that over time, the activities have added much to
company revenues. This could be because, according to the results, there’s much
room for improvement in the ways that many companies identify and evaluate new
opportunities.

Significant value at stake—and modest results

At most companies, pursuing growth in new
product or service categories outside the core is already on the agenda.
Three-quarters of respondents say that over the past five years, their
companies have pursued at least one business activity in a new category.
Another 14 percent say their companies have either considered pursuing this
growth or plan to do so in the next five years.

For many of these companies, growth beyond
their core business is a long-term play. Among C-suite executives (who
respondents most often say are responsible for evaluating these opportunities),
only one in ten say their companies consider new activities for short-term
returns. C-level respondents also say their companies are equally likely to
consider such a move to access new profit pools as to strengthen their core
business.

No matter the reason,
though, few executives report significant top-line results over time from
diversifying activities. Only one-third of all respondents say their companies’
moves beyond the core generate more than 10 percent of their revenues today.
The share of revenues increases with the number of activities that companies
pursue. But even at firms that are active in more than ten product or service
categories, 35 percent of executives say these activities make up more than 10
percent of revenue. What’s more, when asked about the biggest
revenue-generating activity of the past five years, respondents most often say
this move has created just some financial value for their companies.

The emerging-economy advantage

At the same time, executives also report
notable differences in the value that developed-economy and emerging-economy
companies see from these growth activities beyond the core. At companies based
in emerging economies, respondents are about 1.4 times more likely than their
developed-economy peers to say their biggest move in a new category has created
significant value for their companies—likely due to structural advantages in
their home markets.

When asked what gives their companies a
distinctive advantage over those based in developed economies, emerging-economy
respondents most often cite greater opportunities to reinvest retained earnings
in new businesses—easier to do than in developed economies, where relative
growth is much slower—and a greater ability to leverage their local knowledge
and relationships.

Best practices for expanding beyond the core
business

Across regions,
respondents at emerging-economy and developed-economy firms agree on the
approaches their companies use to grow in new areas: investments in organic
growth are cited most often by both groups, followed by mergers and
acquisitions. Both groups are likeliest to identify their executive teams
and boards as the ones responsible for evaluating opportunities in new
categories. There is also consensus among both groups that new activities
shouldn’t stray too far from the core business. When assessing a move’s value
potential, nearly two-thirds of all respondents say unique links between the
activity and the existing business are the most important criteria their
companies consider.

When asked about
different steps in the process of pursuing growth in new categories, few
executives say their companies follow the best practices that make this growth
successful. According to executives, firms most often struggle to scan for new
opportunities, evaluate those opportunities, and integrate new activities into
the core business. But respondents at companies that get the practices right
are much likelier than others—about twice as likely for each of these three steps—to
report that their biggest move in the past five years has created significant
company value.

More specifically, the responses in these
three areas (scanning, evaluation, and integration) suggest which individual
practices link most closely to value creation. When executives say their
companies have a clear strategy for expanding into new activities, for example,
they are four times more likely than those whose companies have no such
strategy to report significant value creation. With respect to managing new
activities, respondents are also four times more likely to report value
creation when their companies actively and regularly review the performance of
these activities.

Looking ahead

·Understand
the market context. The results
indicate that a company’s opportunity to grow successfully beyond its core
business differs across regions, with respondents reporting that growth in new
categories pays off more in emerging economies than in developed economies. We
have also seen that diversifying activities can benefit companies in some
industries more than others. For companies looking to expand into new
activities, it’s important to understand first the extent to which growth
beyond the core in their region and industry is either an opportunity or a risk.

·Find
growth close to home. When asked about
the criteria their companies use to assess a new activity’s potential value,
the largest share of executives say unique links between the activity and the
core business are most important. Companies would do well to follow suit and
start identifying growth opportunities that are close to home—in other words,
ideas or opportunities where they can leverage existing capabilities and skills
in their core business.

·Build
the right capabilities. Most
respondents report that their companies lack the capabilities (or even a clear
strategy) to grow beyond the core, so it’s no wonder that most companies see
only modest contributions to revenue as a result of such activities. However,
companies with the capabilities to scan, evaluate, and integrate opportunities
have a much higher chance to create value with these moves. When planning to
pursue new opportunities outside of their core business, leaders should assess
their companies’ capabilities to make sure the right processes and practices
are in place to maximize the value that new activities can add.

FOR EXHIBITS AND FULL ARTICLE- See more at: http://www.mckinsey.com/Insights/Corporate_Finance/Growing_beyond_the_core_business?cid=other-eml-alt-mip-mck-oth-1507#sthash.SxJ9Mlli.dpuf

Find out the best ways to source money for your venture as per its
growth stage

This deluge has lasted several years, but no one's complain ing.
It has been raining start ups in India for the past 3-4 years and, in fact,
India ranks fifth in the world in terms of startups, with nearly 3,100
currently in operation. In tandem with the surging enterprise, funds are
flowing in like never before and the country is buzzing with options--venture
capitalists, angel investors, incubators and banks. Currently , the number of
active investors in the country include 172 VCs, 43 angel investors and 48
incubators. As much as $4.75 billion of VC funding came through in 2014 and it
has already touched $3.18 billion in 2015, according to Venture Intelligence
and Tracxn!, two VC tracking firms. So, how do you go about securing the
much-needed funds for your starup? We list six options that you can tap.

INCUBATORS

These set-ups precede the seed funding stage and help the
entrepreneur develop a business idea or make a prototype by providing resources
and services in exchange for an equity stake ranging from 2-10%. Incubators
offer office space, administrative support, legal compliances, management
training, mentoring and access to industry experts as well as to funding
through angel investors or VCs. “Most don't offer funding, but make up for it
by providing logistics and external support so that the entrepreneur can focus
on work without worrying about the nittygritty,“ says Devashish Chakravarty ,
an IIM-Ahmedabad alumnus, and Director, Executive Search, QuezX.com, which
provides recruitment for startups.

These are usually government-supported institutes like the IIMs or
IITs, technical institutes or private business incubators run by industry
veterans or companies. The incubation period can be 2-3 years and admission is
rigorous.One has to provide an application to such programmes and is accepted
depending on the quality of idea or other conditions specific to the
institute.Some of the top options in India include IIM-Bangalore NSRCEL,
Microsoft Accelerator and IIT-Kanpur SIIC.

ANGEL INVESTORS

The first stage of actual funding to get your idea off the
workshop and into the market is called seed funding. The funds for this stage
are usually secured by entrepreneurs from their own savings or loans from
family and friends.However, you can also get it from angel investors or
crowdfunding since not many investors and VCs are willing to fund a concept
that has not acquired critical mass or traction.

Angel investors are usually individuals or a group of industry
professionals who are willing to fund your venture in return for an equity
stake.The amounts can range from `5 lakh to `3 crore and are not as high as
those provided by VCs since the risk level at this stage is high. “Team, timing
and potential market size are the three key things I look at in startups,“ says
Anupam Mittal, among India's top 10 angels. You also need to research and tap
the angels who are active in your sector.“Some may be active in technology and
others in travel or food. You can get in touch through your network for family
, friends and colleagues. There are also angel networks across cities and
curation platforms like ours,“ says Amit Banka, founder of Equity Crest, which
helps entrepreneurs connect with investors. The top angels in India include
Rajan Anandan, Indian Angel Network, K. Ganesh, among others.

CROWD FUNDING

This is another recent way of getting seed funding through small
amounts from a large number of people, usually through the Internet. The
entrepreneur can get money for his venture by showcasing his idea before the
entire world and convincing people of its utility and success. Wishberry.in and
Catapooolt are among such forums in India. The entrepreneur needs to put up on
a portal his profile and presentation, which should include the business idea,
its impact, and the rewards and returns for investors. It should be supported
by suitable images and videos of the project. The bottom line is that it should
be convincing enough to draw investors. “The biggest problem is that of
regulation,“ says Chakravarty . “If you are a private limited company , the
number of members or investors can only go up to 200. If you exceed this
number, you turn into a limited company and the compliance and paperwork that
this entails can be daunting,“ he adds.

VENTURE CAPITALISTS

After the initial seed-funding stage comes expansion and growth of
the venture, which requires big money.This is where VCs come in, offering
anywhere from `1-300 crore in exchange for a high equity stake. It is one of
the most popular sources of funding for midto late-stage startups and has been
in the news after big-ticket deals for Flipkart, Snapdeal and Ola. However, one
must make elaborate preparations before approaching the VCs. Says Gopal Modi,
President, Investments, Orios Venture Partners: “Entrepreneurs should focus on
the right team mix, strong product backed by technology, and proven traction,
especially in the case of new ideas where there are no proven models globally
,“ he adds.

You can approach a VC by seeking an introduction through fellow
entrepreneurs who may have received funding from them. Adds Modi: “Approaching
through known networks like exist ing entrepreneurs always works in their
favour. VC funds are more receptive to those referred by other successful
entrepreneurs.“ When you finally meet the potential investors, be prepared to
answer several questions.

CGTMSE LOANS

Under the Credit Guarantee Trust for Micro and Small Enterprises
scheme, meant to encourage entrepreneurs, one can get loans of up to `1 crore
without collateral or surety. Any new and existing micro and small enterprise
can take the loan under the scheme from all scheduled commercial banks and
specified Regional Rural Banks, NSIC, NEDFi, and SIDBI, which have signed an
agreement with the Trust.

BANKS & NBFCs

Loans from banks and NBFCs help finance the purchase of inventory
and equipment, besides securing operating capital and funds for expansion. More
importantly, unlike a VC or angel, which have an equity stake, banks do not
seek ownership in your venture.However, there are several drawbacks. Not only
do you pay interest on loan but it also has to be done on time irrespective of
how your business is faring. They require substantial collateral and a good
track record, besides the fulfilment of other terms and conditions. They also
entail a lot of paperwork.

Researchers have built
a simple and transparent transistor using a single molecule and some atoms. The
breakthrough could be fundamental for future gadgets

An international team of physi cists
has used a scanning tun neling microscope to create a minute transistor
consisting of a single molecule and a small number of atoms. The observed
transistor action is markedly different from the conventionally expected
behaviour and could be important for future device technologies as well as for
fundamental studies of electron transport in molecular nanostructures. The
physicists represent the Paul-Drude-Institut fur Festkorperelektronik (PDI) and
the Freie Universitat Berlin (FUB), Germany, the NTT Basic Research Laboratories
(NTT-BRL), Japan, and the US Naval Research Laboratory (NRL).Their complete
findings appear in the journal Nature Physics.

Transistors have a channel region
between two external contacts and an electrical gate electrode to modulate the
current flow through the channel.In atomic-scale transistors, this current is
extremely sensitive to single electrons hopping via discrete energy levels. In
earlier studies, researchers have examined single-electron transport in
molecular transistors using top-down approaches, such as lithography and break
junctions. But atomically precise control of the gate ­ which is crucial to
transistor action at the smallest size scales ­ is not possible with these
approaches.

The team used a highly stable
scanning tunneling microscope (STM) to create a transistor consisting of a
single organic molecule and positively charged metal atoms, (phthalocyanine
molecule with twelve indium atoms), positioning them with the STM tip on the
surface of an indium arsenide (InAs) crystal. Kiyoshi Kanisawa, a physicist at
NTT-BRL, used the growth technique of molecular beam epitaxy to prepare this
surface. Subsequently, the STM ap proach allowed the researchers to assemble
electrical gates from the +1 charged atoms with atomic precision and then to place
the molecule at various desired positions close to the gates.

Stefan Fölsch, a physicist at the
PDI who led the team, explained that “the molecule is only weakly bound to the
InAs template. So, when we bring the STM tip very close to the molecule and apply
a bias voltage to the tip-sample junction, single electrons can tunnel between
template and tip by hopping via nearly unperturbed molecular orbitals, similar
to the working principle of a quantum dot gated by an external electrode. In
our case, the charged atoms nearby provide the electrostatic gate potential
that regulates the electron flow and the charge state of the molecule.“

But there is a substantial
difference between a conventional semiconductor quantum dot ­ comprising
typically hundreds or thousands of atoms ­ and the present case of a
surface-bound molecule.

Steven Erwin, a physicist at NRL and
expert in density-functional theory, pointed out that, “the molecule adopts
different rotational orientations, depending on its charge state. We predicted
this based on first-principles calculations and confirmed it by imaging the
molecule with the STM.“

This coupling between charge and
orientation has a dramatic effect on the electron flow across the molecule,
manifested by a large conductance gap at low bias voltages.

Piet Brouwer, a physicist at FUB and
expert in quantum transport theory, said, “This intriguing behaviour goes
beyond the established picture of charge transport through a gated quantum dot.
Instead, we developed a generic model that accounts for the coupled electronic
and orientational dynamics of the molecule.“ This simple and physically
transparent model entirely reproduces the experimentally observed
single-molecule transistor characteristics.

It’s almost
conventional wisdom that innovation
springs from developers and entrepreneurs based in start-up hubs such as
Silicon Valley. But in the following video interviews, Intuit cofounder and
chairman Scott Cook, Idealab founder and CEO Bill Gross, and Autodesk president
and CEO Carl Bass contend that large, established companies can also make
innovation a priority. They discuss why a company should be prepared to spend
money on big ideas, how it can remove roadblocks to experimentation, and the
merits of creating its very own idea incubators. These interviews were
conducted by McKinsey Global Institute partner Michael Chui, and edited
transcripts of their remarks follow.

Making innovation easier: Intuit’s Scott Cook

Increasingly, smaller companies—and, in
particular, start-ups—are seen as the hotbeds of innovation. So is it now
destiny that large companies will be dull, slow-moving, slow-growing and that
all the exciting stuff will be done by small, agile start-ups? I don’t think
so. But I think large companies need things like lean start-ups even more than
small companies do.

If I had to point to one thing that’s made the
biggest difference at Intuit—and there’s a package of things—it was to change
how we make decisions, whenever possible, from decision by bureaucracy,
decision by PowerPoint, persuasion, position, power, to decision by experiment.

Normally, companies put up a phalanx of
barriers and hurdles and mountains to climb that may not seem hard for the boss
or the CEO but are intensely hard, impossibly hard, for our young innovator to
conquer. So our job as leaders is how do we get all those barriers out of the
way?

So we put in a series of systems and a culture
where the expectation is that if there’s an idea that someone’s passionate
about, we put in a system to make it easy and fast and cheap for them to run an
experiment. Strip it down to what leap-of-faith assumption you want to prove,
and how you can run an experiment next week or next month, at virtually no
resources, to test that idea. Nothing signals more strongly to your
organization that you want your employees’ ideas. And a culture of
experimentation can only work when it’s put in place by leaders. The innovators
can’t do it.

Scott Cook cofounded Intuit in 1983 and now serves
as the chairman of the executive committee. He previously worked for Bain &
Company and Procter & Gamble. Cook is a member of the board of directors of
eBay; Procter & Gamble; the Harvard Business School Dean’s Advisory Board;
the Center for Brand and Product Management at the University of Wisconsin; and
the Intuit Scholarship Foundation.

Investing in innovation: Idealab’s Bill Gross

I think it’s very, very hard for a company to
grow big and still remain innovative. There are very few leaders who can
balance the short term and the long term together, and also know how important
that growth is, and have a sufficiently long-term horizon that they’re willing
to sacrifice things.

Steve Jobs was one of those amazing people who
could do that. He was willing to cannibalize his iPod revenues, which were $5
billion a year, by putting the whole mp3 player right in every phone. And there
were some people in the company who begged him not to do that. But he said he
didn’t care.

Larry Page is doing
that at Google. He’s willing to invest in Google X,1 where they’ll work on bold, bold
new projects. And they’ll put $500 million toward that, like to the
self-driving car. Now they have the money. But there are some companies that
wouldn’t do that with the money, that wouldn’t take big, bold risks that could
be big game changers

I think big companies should visit and start
their own accelerators and incubators. A lot of big companies in Los Angeles
are doing that; Disney, actually, has an accelerator. It means looking at what
models it takes to actually give people equity stakes so that they can act like
true entrepreneurs, to give them the autonomy but still have them be connected
to the corporation.

I think that’s a model that every big company
can learn from. And I think it’s actually happening. The equitization and the
autonomy are the biggest factors. Because the thing that actually unlocks human
potential is when people feel they have control over their own destiny and they
can make a killing if they really succeed on their wild bet.

Bill Gross founded Idealab in 1996 and serves as
the company’s CEO. He started the company in order to create and build
businesses that capitalize on innovations in areas with significant growth
opportunities. A longtime entrepreneur, Gross founded a company in high school
that sold plans and kits for solar-energy products. In college, at the
California Institute of Technology, he patented a new loudspeaker design and
formed GNP Loudspeakers, Inc. And in 1991, Gross started Knowledge Adventure,
an educational-software publisher that grew to be the third largest of its kind
in the world and was eventually sold.

Taking risks to innovate: Autodesk’s Carl Bass

It’s great that there’s this thread of new
disruptors. As a matter of fact, for CEOs or management of existing companies,
it’s the greatest thing that ever happened, in some way. It’s like the
expression, “Don’t let a good crisis go to waste.”

The threat of somebody doing something is one
of the biggest tools you have to motivate, encourage, scare people into taking
risks they wouldn’t otherwise do. And most corporations are set up and, in some
ways, structured and designed to maximize profit and minimize risk.

Yet what you need to do in order to become the
disruptor, as opposed to the disrupted, is sometimes exactly the opposite. So,
for example, this year we decided for the first time to build our own 3-D
printer, which we are making with an open-source design.

It’s a reference implementation for the
software platform. In the 30-plus years that our company’s been in business,
we’ve never made a piece of hardware. So that, for me, would be new. And I
think a lot of what people substitute for innovation is trying to be three days
ahead of their competitor in the market.

Carl Bass is president and chief executive officer
of Autodesk, a leader in 3-D design, engineering, and entertainment software.
Bass joined Autodesk in 1993, when the company acquired Ithaca Software—which
Bass had cofounded—and has since held several executive positions, including
chief technology officer and chief operations officer. Bass serves on the
boards of directors of Autodesk, Quirky, and E2open.

Michael Chui is a partner at the McKinsey Global Institute and is based
in McKinsey’s San Francisco office.

Thursday, July 30, 2015

Whether it's your job, relationship
or something else, life is starting to feel a bit too predictable. Everywhere
you turn you are seeing more and more people clicking their heels together as
they run off to their next big adventure, while you sit back and make excuses
about why that can't be you.

I'm here to tell you it can
and below are seven sure-fire ways to put the spark back into your ho-hum life starting
now.

1. Live a little (or a lot) right
now.
As we grow older it's only natural to get a bit comfortable with where we are
in life, but with that often comes a sense that we have to be responsible now
so we can live a little later. Life is happening right now and while it might
be smart to have a nest egg for the future, that doesn't mean you can't live a
little (or a lot) right now. Stop making excuses about why you can't go
on that big trip, volunteer in another country, or do that seemingly crazy
thing you've always wanted to try. Life is a journey to be enjoyed, embraced,
and explored and what good is it to wait to do all of those amazing things if
you are too old to enjoy it? Don't wait, do it now.

2. Stop settling for less than
you deserve.
One of the reasons most people get stuck in a rut is because they are simply
settling for what they have now, even if they desire more. If you aren't in a
job you love or your relationship isn't serving you, it's time for a change.
Set your sights higher and know that you not only deserve more, but you are
capable of bringing your desires to fruition. Be willing to stand by your
convictions and trust that what you want is possible the moment you stop
settling for what feels most realistic and logical. When in doubt, shoot
for the stars.

3. Be willing to shake things up
a bit.
If life is feeling a bit ho-hum it's likely because you have been too afraid to
step outside your comfort zone a bit. Learn a new language, try new foods, and
challenge yourself to get out and meet new people. Sure it can feel
uncomfortable at first, but the more you are willing to try new things, the
more you will feel that spark of life again.

4. Don't forget to dream again.
As time goes on our dreams tend to fall by the wayside and take a backseat to reality.
The truth is, your dreams can become your reality as soon as you give them some
quality time and attention. So if you could be, have, or do anything in the
world, what would it be? What are some things that have been playing the back
of your mind as 'too good to be true' or 'not realistic'? Tap into your
imagination and see what amazing dreams you come up with and then take steps to
make them your reality.

5. Release & let go of the
things that no longer serve you.
If you are feeling like life is a bit stagnant lately it's also likely true
that you haven't let go of people, places, or things that no longer fit into
your ideal life. Extra stuff (whether physical or emotional) does nothing but
weigh you down and make it hard for new energy and experiences to flow. What
old stuff are you hanging onto out of habit? When you are willing to release
the old stuff, you make room for more vibrant energy and experiences to come
your way.

6. Be willing to take risks.
Nothing in life is guaranteed and yet so many of us worry about taking risks
because we fear the worst possible outcome. Whether you are risking your time,
energy, or money, sometimes being willing to take risks is just what you need
to shake things up a bit in your life. Whether you want to make a move across
the world or self-publish a book that you aren't sure will sell, taking the
risk is often the first step to success.

7. Tap into your inner child again and just have fun!
I can't say this enough. Life isn't meant to be this ho-hum, boring period of
time that we simply have to endure. It's meant to be a journey of enlightening
and exciting experiences. We don't know how long we have this amazing gift and
if you aren't making time everyday to do something that puts a smile on your
face, it's time for that to change. Tap into your inner child and do some of
the things you loved before you were conditioned to be responsible.
Whether you run, play, laugh or sing, make sure you are having fun every single
day.

I’ve
often wondered what goes into creating a company that people are happy to work
for — a company that lands, for example, at the top of aForbes list
of best places to work. To gain some insight, I scheduled an interview with
Paul Giobbi, the co-founder and CEO of Zumasys, a company that provides
cloud-based infrastructure services. Giobbi’s company has appeared on Inc. magazine’s
list of America’s fastest-growing companies six times, and has
recently been named one of the best places to work by theOrange County Register, the Orange County Business Journal, and Computerworld. Impressive recognition, especially
considering that the company had been struggling with an average of 16 percent
employee turnover per year only five years ago.

When
I arrived at Zumasys’s building for my interview with Giobbi, I found a
could-be-anywhere light-industrial business center with a nice, but generic,
technology company lobby (clean and quiet, with a stocked kitchen and employee
lounge visible for all to see). I wandered around the lobby trying to discover
clues as to why this company is one of the best places to work in Southern
California. I was briefly interrupted by a lobby-lingering employee offering me
the opportunity drink tea from a straw that strains the tea leaves. Nice, I
thought, but is this what makes magazines and newspapers heap accolades on this
place?

A
few minutes later, I was personally greeted by Giobbi. On the way to his
office, he proudly showed off the Avocado Award (imagine half of a fake avocado
mounted on a wood block) hanging in the hall — apparently, he had won first
place at the company’s guacamole-making contest. At that point, I started to
get it: the corporate culture seemed to be quirky, humble, funny, and friendly.
And as I settled in for the interview, it became clear that something special
was going on at Zumasys.

Given
the commodity nature of IT infrastructure, Giobbi told me, “The only way to win
is with inspired and motivated employees delivering superior customer service.”
With superior business results in mind, he has spearheaded a quest over the
past five years to “create a culture to serve as a fortress around the company
by making it such a great place to work that nobody would want to leave.” With
voluntary turnover now less than 2 percent per year, it’s clear that the
Zumasys culture quest has been a success.

For
the first two years of its turnaround, Zumasys executives focused on hiring
people who were self-aware and passionate, and trusted them with free reign to
work as they saw fit by setting clear expectations. The company then
strengthened its culture by amping up its benefits package and introducing an
open-book policy on its financials. At Zumasys, in addition to the typical
corporate benefits, every employee gets three to four weeks of vacation,
complementary access to the company’s two-bedroom Vegas loft, and the
opportunity to qualify for a tenure-based international travel program that,
each year, gives four to six employees a week off with pay and a $4,000 stipend
to travel to the destination of their choice. The open-book financials are used
as the foundation for a measurement-based reward program, with all employees
eligible to participate, capped off annually with a trip for award winners.

It
was a good start. These changes engendered additional goodwill by underscoring
the company’s commitment to employees, but they didn’t have much impact on
lowering turnover. Something was still missing. Committed to exploring and
experimenting, Giobbi attended a conference where Bert Jacobs, founder
of Life Is Good, encouraged attendees to use their companies as a platform for
social change. Reflecting on Jacobs’s message, Giobbi realized that what was
missing from his company wasmeaning. People want more than fun, perks,
or the bottom line — everyone strives to live, and work, for a greater purpose.
Upon returning home, Giobbi pledged to donate 1 percent of the company's
annual revenue to
nonprofit organizations nominated and selected by his employees. He called the
program “Happyness Is a Choice.”

He
believes that this single decision “has been more impactful than all of our
other decisions combined.” But the change didn’t happen overnight. For the
first couple of years after the program was established, it was hard to get
employees’ attention, and a good chunk of the money remained unallocated.
(“Faceless non-profits don’t feel good,” Giobbi said.) He found that the key to
gaining traction was to involve employees personally. To do so, Zumasys
implemented two changes. First, it partnered with the nonprofit
accelerator OneOC to serve up carefully selected, company-wide
volunteer opportunities for its employees. Second, and much more powerful, was
the company’s decision to allocate 10 percent of that 1 percent of revenue to
“people in need in our network,” including relatives, friends, neighbors, and coworkers
who were facing hard times.

Giobbi
recalled a story involving Robert, a Zumasys sales rep, and Eric, an employee
of one of the company’s customers. Robert learned that Eric, who has a spouse
with multiple sclerosis, needed additional sponsorship for his participation in
an upcoming Walk MS event. Robert
arranged for Zumasys to donate, added some money of his own, and jumped on a
plane to join Eric on the walk. Eric’s follow-up email to Robert illustrates
the power of program:

“My
wife was overwhelmed with emotions when she found out that you traveled all the
way from Vegas to join our walk. She had asked if you had a family member or
someone you knew personally that was suffering with MS. I simply told her that
you do now. I want to personally thank you for taking the time to be with us
and acknowledging our cause. The actions you take every day and the generosity
you show to your community are a shining example of what we all strive to be as
human beings. We are all blessed to have what we have but to share that with
people you don’t even know firsthand is truly a miracle at work.”

According
to Giobbi, “This is a textbook example of what we want to accomplish. Most
people can’t get beyond thinking about themselves to do something for somebody
else, but after this and many other similar stories, our employees are
aggressively submitting donation requests and fervently committed to the
volunteer events.”

And
it’s not just employees. Increasingly, Zumasys’s customers are getting involved
with Happyness Is a Choice; every chance he gets, Giobbi invites them to
provide their input, telling them, “It’s your 1 percent. Let us know how you
want us to direct it.” To encourage broader employee — and customer —
participation, Zumasys is increasing the “in-network” allocation from 10 to 20
percent of the 1 percent of revenue in the coming year.

Over
time, Giobbi plans to continue experimenting with programs that strengthen his
cultural fortress. One idea, in support of Zumasys’s 15th anniversary, involves
an RV filled with employees and customers that will travel around the country
and host volunteer events. He is convinced that celebrating and serving
together will create meaningful connections and lifelong relationships.

Of
course, the success of Zumasys’s programs is dependent on the leadership behind
them. Ann Rhoades, a company-culture expert and author of the book Built on Values: Creating an Enviable
Culture That Outperforms the Competition says, “If there is a secret shared by
companies that create customer-centric cultures, it is that their leaders
profoundly understand that people really are their biggest assets — and they
act on that idea every day. Organizations that truly value people often don’t
use it as an advertising slogan. They just do it.”

For
Giobbi, the payoff from culture goes beyond the bottom line. Even if conscious
capitalism wasn’t good for business (though expert research shows that clearly it is),
he believes that each of us should have at least one amazing work experience
with a company, and he is committed to “giving Zumasys employees the ride of
their lives.”